Since graduating from the Monk Institute, widely renowned as the highest-level jazz education program in the world, Gordon has been making waves in both traditional and modern jazz circles, all from his home base in New York City. His unique creative voice blends influences that span a full century: from the traditional/early jazz of Louis Armstrong and Bix Beiderbecke to the modern jazz of the new millenium.

B A C K G R O U N DAs an undergraduate, Gordon studied jazz composition and performance at Berklee College of Music, where he recorded with Danilo Perez, co-arranged and recorded with Tiger Okoshi, and performed with Max Weinberg, Jimmy Heath, Makoto Ozone, Bob Mintzer, George Garzone, and Ralph Peterson. Under the tutelage of Joe Lovano, George Garzone, Joanne Brackeen, Hal Crook, Tiger Okoshi, Phil Wilson, Ed Tomassi, and Dave Santoro, among others, Gordon graduated in 2007 with a full scholarship and top departmental awards in both jazz composition and performance.

Following Berklee, Gordon was selected as one of just seven fellows at the inaugural New Orleans class of the Thelonious Monk Institute for Jazz Performance, where, under the artistic direction of Terence Blanchard, he and his colleagues honed their skills at performing, composing, and teaching. They gave concerts, clinics, and private lessons in Louisiana as well as around the globe, including New Delhi, Mumbai, the Panama Jazz Festival, and Hollywood. Through the Institute, Gordon studied and performed with some of greatest living masters of jazz and beyond: Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Chaka Khan, Zakir Hussain, George Benson, Ravi Shankar, Shankar Mahadevan, Brian Blade, George Duke, Ron Carter, Benny Golson, Danilo Perez, Lewis Nash, Ellis Marsalis, Buster Williams, Nicholas Payton, John Scofield, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Jimmy Heath, Kenny Barron, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Terri Lyne Carrington, Steve Coleman, Barry Harris, Kurt Elling, Nnenna Freelon, James Genus, Kendrick Scott, Brice Winston, and artistic director Terence Blanchard.

T R A D I T I O N A L / E A R L Y . J A Z ZWhile at the Monk Institute, Gordon co-founded the New Orleans Moonshiners, a group described in the press as “a trad jazz band with new souls" that has “taken the area by storm, gaining a huge fan base and lots of critical acclaim," and had their east coast debut at Lincoln Center in 2010. Their second album, including four of Gordon’s originals, was nominated for traditional jazz album of the year by New Orlean’s Offbeat magazine. Presently, Gordon frequently appears at music festivals around the country as both Guest Artist and as leader of the Au Brothers Jazz Band. In New York, Gordon leads the Grand St. Stompers, a traditional jazz band hailed as “the past, present, future rolling on!" by music writers; they perform around the nation, at such venues as the famed Cafe Carlyle and Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola (upcoming). In addition, Gordon maintains a busy schedule of concerts, dances, festivals, exchanges, and camps, with popular groups including the Grammy-winning Vince Giordano & the Nighthawks, Dandy Wellington & His Band, Baby Soda, Tamar Korn & Friends, Glenn Crytzer, and Jazz at Lincoln Center’s WeBop ensemble.

M O D E R N . J A Z ZIn the modern vein, Gordon has performed with Wayne Shorter, Terence Blanchard, Nicholas Payton, Ellis and Jason Marsalis, Ron Carter, Wycliffe Gordon, Jimmy Heath, Kurt Rosenwinkel, John Scofield, Lewis Nash, and George Benson; toured internationally with Herbie Hancock, Chaka Khan, and George Duke; and recorded with the Danilo Perez Big Band and Grammy winners Brian Blade and George Garzone, among others. In 2011–12, Gordon toured internationally with tenor saxophonist and Monk Competition winner Melissa Aldana; their 2012 album Second Cycle, featuring an innovative chordless quartet and three of Gordon’s original compositions, won the Altazor National Arts Award in Chile for Best Album. His musical tours in both traditional and modern jazz arenas have taken him to India, Japan, Australia, England, France, Spain, Finland, the Netherlands, Israel, and Panama.

W R I T I N G / P R O D U C I N GIn addition to producing and writing albums for the Grand St. Stompers and Au Brothers Jazz Band, Gordon has written big band arrangements for Terence Blanchard, co-arranged and recorded with Tiger Okoshi, transcribed for Chaka Khan, and completed several commissions for the 3rd-stream Blue Moon Ensemble. In 2013, Gordon served as Musical Director, conductor, and arranger for the genre-blending album Ejazz Con Jota by Carmen París, featuring Gordon’s big band jazz arrangements of Spanish jota songs.

T E A C H I N GGordon has served as guest lecturer at Loyola University of New Orleans, taught at UC Berkeley, served as Visiting Artist at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, served as clinician and adjudicator at the Sacramento Traditional Jazz Youth Band Festival, taught at countless music camps, and given clinics in New Orleans, New York, Panama, Finland, and Japan. Currently, Gordon teaches and appears as Guest Artist for Jazz at Lincoln Center’s WeBop program.

PERFORMANCE HIGHLIGHTS

June 2014: Vince Giordano & the Nighthawks play the American premiere of Cole Porter’s lost 1928 show “The Ambassador Revue," with Grammy-winner Catherine Russell, Tony nominees Tom Wopat and Anita Gillette, and four-time Bistro Award-winner Jason Graae, at Town Hall in New York, NY

May 2014: featured Guest Artist at 41st Annual Sacramento Music Festival in CA

April 2014: featured Guest Artist at 41st Annual Jazzaffair in Three Rivers, CA

December 2012: Lindy Focus XI, the “premier Lindy Hop New Year’s event of the United States," with Glenn Crytzer and Solomon Douglas

November 2012: Festival Internacional de Jazz de Barcelona and Utrecht swing dance, with Gordon Webster

October 2012: featured Guest Artist at Jubilee by the Sea 2012 jazz festival in Pismo Beach, CA

June 2012: wedding reception of Elettra Rossellini Weidemann (daughter of Isabella Rossellini) and James Marshall, with Baby Soda Jazz Band

June 2012: McCarren Park Pool Grand Re-Opening hosted by Mayor Bloomberg, with the Grand St. Stompers

February 2012: five-night engagement at Jazz at Lincoln Center, Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, with the Melissa Aldana Quintet

December 2011: Israel’s Ashdod International Jazz Festival, with Tamar Korn and Baby Soda Jazz Band

December 2011: the inaugural Albany Lindy and Blues Exchange, with the Grand St. Stompers

November/December 2011: tour of Spain with international flamenco star Carmen París and the Melissa Aldana Quintet; performances included Valencia, the Teatro Principal of Zaragoza, Murcia, and Barcelona

October 2011: featured guest artist at the 35th annual “Jubilee by the Sea" jazz festival in Pismo Beach, CA, and the festival debut of the Au Brothers Jazz Band

September 2011: HBO series “Boardwalk Empire" season 2 official wrap party, with Vince Giordano & the Nighthawks

July 2011: Louis Armstrong House Museum in Queens, NY, with the Grand St. Stompers

June 2011: performed for a crowd of 2,500 at Toledo City Hall Plaza, with flamenco singer Carmen París and New York jazz musicians Melissa Aldana, Camila Meza, Pablo Menares, and Jeffrey Fajardo [link]

June 2011: ASCAP Jazz Wall of Fame Induction Ceremony; performed Azalea with Vince Giordano and David Ostwald, in honor of George Avakian (producer for Louis Armstrong, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Dave Brubeck, and others), for his induction as a Living Legend into the ASCAP Jazz Wall of Fame [link]